Archive for May 4th, 2009

Arsenal’s players and coaches are a little over 24 hours away from the biggest game in their young careers and yet, it’s the business end of the club that’s receiving all of the press.

As I reported on Saturday, Stan Kroenke is now the largest, no wait, the mostest shareholder having purchased some 4,000 shares from the Carr family and pushing his total up to just over 28%. How all this happened I’m not sure, but I do know that however that transaction occured it ticked off Arsenal’s largest, no wait, fattest shareholder and he reported the transaction to some kind of board (the takeover panel) that I’ve never heard of.

It reminds me of this one guy who was going to go to the prom with this hot chick and then at the last minute she called and said she was going to go with the star football player and you’re left holding a ton of shares that you paid a ton of money for. Something like that. Anyway, it makes sense that he’d pursue legal action; he is essentially the jilted lover here. So, the courts will suss it out and everything and there isn’t much we can do.

I do want to mention, however, how funny it is that places like Arseblog and the Arsenal Supporter’s Trust were firmly against Stan Kroenke (HA HA SATAN KROENKE!!!) buying into the club, until they got a load of who else might try to buy Arsenal. I’m sure this is mostly down to the fact that Kroenke was duped by Dein in the early days but it’s still interesting how pretty much everyone is now firmly in the American’s corner. Kroenke, as it turns out, is a huge Arsenal supporter and will be good for the club. Just look at what he’s done with the web site, that’s what he’ll do with the Arsenal; update it, while keeping the heart of the team firmly rooted in Arsenal’s history.

Now, if only he could do something about the rumored green kits…

Meanwhile, Setanta is edging closer to going out of business. My regular reader knows that I make fun of Setanta but the reality is that I like having choices and if Setanta goes out of business I’m afraid we will lose choices. Before Setanta came along Americans got to watch Arsenal whenever Fox Soccer Channel wanted to let us watch them, or if we bought a match over PPV. But since Setanta got in on the action I’ve basically, over the last several years, had the fortune to watch pretty much every single Arsenal game. If Setanta goes away I’m afraid that priviledge will go away as well. We’ll have to see how Fox handles the new contracts they won, but if Setanta can’t make all those games pay, I wonder if Fox will be able to?

Finally, I have a little Arsenal America business to attend to. Some of you may know that I am the Seattle rep for Arsenal America. As the Seattle rep, I’ve been asked to take an accounting of the local supporters here in the PNW. So, if you’re a local (live in the Seattle/Tacoma area) and an Arsenal supporter, please send me an email (bostelle at gmail) so I can get an account of how many Arsenal supporters we have in our region. You don’t have to be a member of Arsenal America, just a local.

THANKS!

Ok, so tomorrow Arsenal play some kind of “huge” game or something and pretty much everyone’s jazzed. Wenger’s keeping the faith, Walcott’s keeping the faith, and I’m just like frequent reader, Connoly’s Agent; tired of all the talk. Let’s get it on, gods damn it.

One final note, Setanta is reporting that Robin van Persie is fit and will start tomorrow. Now, I don’t know where they got that information, but I don’t think it can be trusted. We need Robin no doubt, but I’m not getting my hopes up until I read it on the dot com. So, take it with a grain of salt.